Join in and Give

Supporting the Buddhist Centre

As a charity (registration no. 514937), we rely on the generosity of everyone who values the Centre to keep our doors and activities open to as many people as possible. We can all give in many different ways.

Donation bowls

We always welcome cash donations in the Centre’s donation bowls. Or you can make a card donation by telephone or at reception.

Monthly donations

Regular monthly donations are particularly helpful as they enable us to budget effectively. No amount is too big or too small. You can set them up online through our MyDonate page, or use a standing order form – print a copy here or get one at the Centre, and please pass the completed form direct to us, not your bank. If you are a UK tax payer you can gift aid your donation, whether online or on paper.

One-off online giving

Leaving a gift in your will

If you are thinking about making a will, please consider including a bequest to the Centre. Satyadasa offers a will-writing service for UK members and friends of the Triratna Buddhist Community, and his website has useful information on why and how to make a will.

Give things as well as money

We raise over £4,000 a year from the ground floor second hand books shelves, and we’d love the books you no longer need, any subject! Crafts and shrine goods welcome for regular stalls too, also Dharma books for the library, especially from the Triratna Buddhist tradition.

Fundraising events

Join in with fundraising for the Centre through our My Donate pages. Take part in an event yourself, organise one or sponsor others.

Sharing our time and skills

Working together

The Centre depends on a lot of us giving our time and energy freely. If you are a regular at the Centre, and have completed a Buddhism Level 2 / Going Deeper course or often come to Saturday’s Tools for Living your Life, let us know if you’d like to join us.

We need people to join in with cleaning, decorating and making events go smoothly, and sometimes to take on specific skilled tasks. It’s a chance to be at the heart of things, make friends and know that our actions make a difference to hundreds of people every week. Some of us do regular slots, others just now and then.

Cleaning together on Tuesdays

Clean-up Tuesdays are a great place to start – an hour or two on Tuesday lunchtimes keeping the Centre beautiful and spending time together – see What’s on.

It was great working as a team with other members of our Sangha who I had never met before or just knew by face. It makes me feel that I am part of the Centre and not just a visitor

Interested?

Our Centre was built on Generosity

Through our own Efforts

In the 1990s a committed group of men and women, mostly working for free, transformed a run down Victorian warehouse into a beautiful jewel. Since then, hundreds more have given time, skills and money to help the Centre communicate Buddhist teachings and meditation to thousands of people. Manchester Buddhist Centre is a registered charity with no outside funding or wealthy benefactors.

Continuing Generosity

We get some income from courses, events, room hire and rents from others in the building, but these don’t cover all our costs. We rely on the generosity of our Sangha, visitors and supporters to join us in keeping the Centre and its activities alive and growing.

One step on Buddhism’s eightfold path is right or skilful action, which encourages us to develop and express compassion and kindness for the welfare of all living beings and for our world

Generosity in the Wider World

Compassion, generosity and the importance of connections between us are central to the practice of Buddhism and many of our community give time and money to international causes, such as Young Indian Futures and Karuna or work with local charities or in chaplaincy.

Combining a spiritual practice with action for change in the wider world has become known as socially engaged Buddhism. and this is our focus in Buddhist Action Month every June.

About our Finances

Our income, spending and activities

Here are the details for 2017, the latest twelve month period we have figures for, with shorter summaries in the three boxes:

What does it help us do?

Thousands of people visited the Centre in 2017, using our meditation halls, tea area, shop, library and meeting spaces, as well as attending courses and events

We held eight taster meditation sessions a week; six six-week courses in Buddhism and six in meditation; eight one-day courses; and a weekly two-hour Saturday introductory session through the year. Those who could not afford the nominal charge paid a concessionary rate or attended free

Two thousand school and college students visited and learned about Buddhism

See our full report for details of the year’s retreats, festivals, study groups and weekend events, as well as information on our residential communities, ethical businesses, volunteer support, ordination process, mindfulness training for local organisations and more

Stan Kukalowicz Bursary Fund

Stan Kukalowicz

Stan was a much-loved member of our Sangha who sadly died in 2014.

Stan had always wanted to help those in need. He had been keen to set up a fund to help Sangha members in financial difficulty to get on retreat and also wanted to encourage our practice of generosity. Stan touched the lives of many people so a bursary fund in his name seemed a fitting tribute. The fantastic generosity of Stan’s friends and family after his death enabled us to do this and the fund is already helping the Sangha just as Stan hoped.

About the Retreat Fund

The fund is mainly to help people who couldn’t normally afford it to go on a Manchester Buddhist Centre weekend Sangha retreats – mixed, men’s or women’s. Any money left can help Sangha members otherwise unable to go to a Triratna retreat centre. If you’d like to give to the fund, please contact reception or donate online at Stan Kukalowicz Bursary Fund

How to apply

In a sense, giving is the basic Buddhist virtue without which you can hardly call yourself a Buddhist. It consists not so much in the act of giving as in the feeling of wanting to give, of wanting to share what you have with other people. This feeling of wanting to give or share is often the first manifestation of the spiritual life.